Afrovibes Festival

Afrovibes Festival 2024: Belonging

Based on the theme Belonging , Afrovibes is shaping this year's festival program with performances that focus on North Africa and the (North) African diaspora in the Netherlands. North African countries are often considered 'non-African' but part of the Arab world. Do artists from North Africa feel connected to the African continent and an African identity or to an Arab identity? Each in their own way, the makers who will be at Afrovibes this year explore what Belonging means to them. They delve into cultural and political debates about identity, diaspora and decolonization. They explore our desire to belong somewhere, to have a home. Together they provide an artistic answer to the question of how artists in North Africa and in the North African communities in the Netherlands experience their identity and their cultural heritage.

A selection from the program in Amsterdam

Afrovibes opens on October 2 at Frascati in Amsterdam with the Dutch premiere of El Botinière by the Tunisian choreographer Selim Ben Safia. This mythical cabaret highlights the hidden side of Tunisian nightlife where joy, sadness, love, hate, desires and life are intertwined. A metaphor for the toxic world of the 'patriarchal hypocritical Arab-Islamic society' in which people cannot be who they want to be.

With Dhiya, the Moroccan choreographer Mohamed Lamqayssi tells the story of the Amazigh queen Dihya and opens a temporary door to an alternative scenario in which she won the battle against the Umayyad and power and sacrifice lead to freedom and love. A hidden history of the Amazigh culture that could have been. To be seen at Frascati (Dutch premiere).

In the interactive performance The Waterproofed Artist, the Moroccan choreographer Youness Atbane takes a skeptical look at the power dynamics within the global art scene. The performance is set in 2048, during the 72nd edition of the famous Venice Biennale. The festivities come to a abrupt halt when - as climatologists had already predicted - Venice begins to sink... Can be seen at Frascati (Dutch premiere) and at De Balie.

At Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ, the vibrant sounds of Gnaoua - mysterious Sufi music - come together with personal stories during Gnaoua Again! by the Moroccan theater maker Ghassan El Hakim. Together with one of Morocco's greatest gnaoua masters - Maalem Abdellah El Gourd - and musicians Soufiane El Ghazouani, Amine Naouni and Farid Ghannam, he makes a journey into the past.

More info

View full program information at the locations below:

October 2 to 5 Frascati

October 11 & 12 De Balie

October 13 Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ